Tensions, conflicts and exclusion: Sports medicine and sport science during the turbulent decades of the 1950s and 1960s

Abstract

When World War Two finished, there was a collective sigh of relief with the promise of a less strife-torn world. The 1950s and 1960s, though, were almost as tumultuous as the previous decade. More wars, political coups, nuclear threats, assassinations, decolonisation and revolutions in popular culture shattered any notions of social, political and economic tranquillity. Sport, too, was caught up in the turmoil. Not only were Germany and Japan pariahs in international competitions, but there were also revolutions in the way sport was conceived, organised and managed. The emergence of sports medicine and sports science in Australia were part of the reconceptualisation of sport that, like the broader political context, suffered from tensions that often erupted into enduring conflicts. This presentation examines the tensions and conflicts in the emergence of sports medicine in Australia. The nascent sports medicine organisations had to resolve political struggles for power between New South Wales and Victorian entities, and had to determine the criteria for membership of the Australian Sports Medicine Federation—a hotly contested issue. Similarly, a key component of sports medicine, sport science was in an embryonic stage of development and confronting the concept of “the body as a machine” as coaches battled over experimentation with athletes and radically different paradigms of training regimes. As much as sport medicine practitioners and sport scientists were fighting internal battles, both struggled with Australian sporting organisations which were responsible for athletes at the Olympic Games and Commonwealth Games. Gaining recognition from Olympic and Commonwealth Games officials was a long, hard-fought battle for sports medicine practitioners, sport scientists and coaches. In many ways, the struggles of the decades following World War Two helped shape the roles of contemporary sports medicine, sport science and coaching in Australian sport.